Don’t Ignore Gen X Customers

What consumers are you targeting? Are you missing a big segment?

So I hear that marketers in all service and product categories are overlooking Generation X consumers as targets for their sales messages. Gen Xers are those spunky folks who fall between their mid-30s and mid-50s. You know, people like me. Yes, I’m a Gen Xer.

And I guess I’m not appealing to marketers because I’m sandwiched in between two other bigger and louder groups: baby boomers and millennials — or, as I know them, my parents and some of my nieces and nephews.

Sure, baby boomers and millennials have size. Boomers are part of a 77 million-person group, while millennials stand 83 million strong. That’s quite large compared to me and my 65 million counterparts.

And while boomers have their offline world, millennials are easy to understand with their love of everything technology. Boomers were defined by civil rights and women’s movements, and millennials brought us social media and define themselves as socially progressive. I guess that makes Gen Xers hard to label. Sure, I came of age as technology was evolving. I may have learned to type on a typewriter, but I quickly adapted to using a computer keyboard. And my first cellphone was bigger than my purse, but I’ve transitioned nicely through each and every update since then. As marketers describe me, I have “one foot in the past and one foot in the future,” and that makes me hard to understand. I don’t call that complicated; I call that complex. It gives me and my Gen X brothers and sisters character.

What marketers are missing, according to an article in AdWeek, is the spending power of my strong and mighty generation. Yep, we account for 31 percent of consumer spending, according to Acxiom research. We also have a home ownership rate of 82 percent, according to MetLife; sure, I own a home and have hired a landscape professional. And we have a brand loyalty rate of 70 percent. If I like your service, I’ll call you again — without question.

See, we’re not that bad. Instead of always targeting what’s trending, you might want to look a little closer at this “sandwich generation.” We could be some of your best customers.